Using The iPad Photo Stream To Develop Collaborative Learning

As part of an ongoing project at  Bellfield Primary School in Hull, year 5 are studying the book Pig Heart Boy by Malorie Blackman.


This week's lesson was based around issues related to animal rights and medical research.  The children had access to iPad Minis which were connected to the school's wireless network.

Sharing resources

By creating a photo stream, resources for the day could be shared with the pupils. These included photos, success criteria and examples of work. Pupils could then take copies of the content and annotate and present as they chose. The photo stream was created on one iPad and then shared with the individual pupil iPads.

Resources shared in the Photo Stream

Photo shared to all the iPad Minis in Photo Stream

Discussion and collaboration

The most powerful feature when sharing content via the photo stream in the classroom is the commenting facility. This allows pupils to add comments, ask questions and develop discussions in real-time.  Furthermore, the headteacher and others can engage with the discussion remotely. This supports the valuable strategy of presenting pupil outcomes to a real audience and links well with blogging activities.

The comments appear in a list alongside an image and are updated as they happen (See pictures Below). This week the pupils looked at several posters and documents which provided differing opinions and viewpoints on the subject of animal testing for medicine.  They added their own views and asked questions and engaged with the issues of the discussion as it developed.

There are many applications for this such as:

• Collaborative projects
• Debates
• Feedback and formative assessment
• Shared and guide writing.
• Maths strategy sharing/discussion
• Sharing vocabulary 
• Modelling sentence structures
• Mini Plenaries